Should Detroit's municipal retirees lose their pensions?

[Wry Catcher]

Before I get labeled "pro union" here, I should mention I don't believe unions have a place in professional occupations like teachers or service workers. I believe that the dangerous industries like auto manufacturing, mines, foundries, and textiles do have a need for union protection for worker safety. But doesn't OSHA cover that now you might ask? Sure, but not very closely when the GOP is in power. So there you have it....JoeBlam, union man, and right-to-work man.....depends on who's ox is getting gored is where I step in.

OSHA does not work very good either when it is a sister govt agency they are looking at....

Public safety officers also face dangers on the job. Decisions made by pols and managers deserve to be vetted by line staff's union business agents. So too do teachers and social workers, eligibility workers and other government workers who many times are the faces seen by those pissed off at the pols who make policies.

 

[Caroljo]

Do you fools think Detroit is the only bankrupt city?

Do you think only Democrats increased the gifts showered on public employees around the country during the Wall Street derivatives boom?

I strongly suggest you investigate the derivative schemes your own local metropolis is all wound up in. You might find your hair falling out.

Can you conclusively show the derivative schemes on Wall Street are why this happened? I'm sure it had an effect, as they did everywhere, but I have a pretty good feeling Detroit's woes have mostly to do with a few generations of patronage and pandering for votes.

And the Unions......

 

[thanatos144]

the politicians and the Union for Crooks that's a guarantee yet i have to ask Is our word good anymore? there are some in this thread alone I'm glad I don't work for they don't think that keeping their word is all that important

 

[MeBelle]

You're full of shit to make this a Democrat problem. There are cities all over the US that have been run by Democrats that are NOT going bankrupt.

Get your partisan pea-brain out of your partisan ass.

btw, remember Orange County, 1995? Republican conservative stronghold Orange County?

Bankrupt. Am I entitled to validly conclude from that that REPUBLICAN municipal management causes bankruptcies?

Nope!
Robert Citron - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Robert Lafee Citron (April 14, 1925 – January 16, 2013) was a Democratic Party politician who was the longtime Treasurer-Tax Collector of Orange County, California, when it declared Chapter 9 bankruptcy on December 6, 1994. Citron was the only Democrat to hold office in heavily Republican Orange County at the time. The bankruptcy was brought on by Citron's investment strategies,[1] which seemed to be an effort to earn high incomes for the county without raising taxes through risky, leveraged positions in interest-rate derivative contracts. The strategy paid out at first. In 1994, a cash crunch occurred when interest rates increased and financiers for the county required increased collateral from the county.


Citron Pleads Guilty to Felonies : Former O.C. Treasurer Implicates Aide Raabe
April 28, 1995
Citron Pleads Guilty to Felonies : Former O.C. Treasurer Implicates Aide Raabe - Los Angeles Times

SANTA ANA — In a stunning admission that implicated his once-loyal assistant, former Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron pleaded guilty Thursday to misappropriating public funds, falsifying documents and misleading nearly 200 government agencies that trusted him to invest their money.
This Is The 4/95 Plea/Sentencing Agreement Of Bob Citron Re: His Criminal Role In The Orange County Bankruptcy

 

[MeBelle]

Syrenn as far as i am concerned when you are 20 years old and you land a great job with a PENSION.....and here it is 30-40 years later and you are thinking about that retirement that you contributed too.....you get it.....i thing i have noticed is ....no one seems to give a flying fuck....of course until they are the one whose pension is being pulled.....then all of a sudden,it makes a difference.....maybe everyone should just work until you drop dead on the job,throw your carcass in a pit and grab the next 20 year old to do it again....

Harry you can't compare your Federal pension plan with the lovely likes of CalPERS. You know... the 3.5%@ 50.

 

[Jarlaxle]

can you walk into an auto and work..... and NOT be a paying union member?

yea walked into BmW in greenville SC for a week doing a side electrical job not a union guy on site and those operators get paid a decent wage btw.

BMW ran from their own workers to build Beemers here.....let's see if their customers will buy a US-assmebled BMW.

They have been for damn near twenty years now! The plant in Spartanburg, SC opened in 1994.

 

[Jarlaxle]

EXCUSE ME. My uncle fought those little bastards across the Pacific until he was wounded on Saipan.....you don't seem to understand the war never ended for them.

and do you think you were the only one with family in the pacific theater?

Nobody who did would ever drive a Jap car is what I know. I never have. My uncle would have gone through Obama's SS to get at him for bowing to their fucking emperor.

I have seen WW2 veterans driving Japanese cars. My grandfather's last car was a Camry...he was wounded at Leyte Gulf. (He was a gunner on the Heermann.)

 

[LuckyDuck01!]

Take away elderlies pensions? Hmm, I'd like to see you end up as many of them would, on the streets, with cardboard signs and hungry.

 

[boedicca]

The public employees should receive a haircut on their pensions. These were not negotiated in good faith as the officials who negotiated with the unions are on the same side...milking the taxpayer.

Well, the cow's udder is dry, and the poor beast is in the process of being dismembered to feed the parasites.

I heard one political hack say that the bondholders should get nothing because they were "speculators"...so lending money to a city is now extremely risky speculation. That's good to know. Let interest rates reflect that fact.

 

[boedicca]

Oh, and Detroit should rename itself "Starnesville" at this point.

 

[Clementine]

Lots of talk about doing that and i say go for it. These were all affirmative action hires and didn't deserve the job in the first place.

It's not that anyone should lose anything. It's solely the fault of those responsible for safekeeping the pension funds. When union leaders and politicians make promises they can't keep, people don't get what was promised.

It's not fair that people should lose something they were promised and worked for, though when it comes to relying on public funding, you have to ask how fair it is for politicians and unions to make such sweet deals with the tax payer money that has yet to be made. They sure are generous with other peoples' money and they reap the rewards until it runs out.

I am betting that Detroit officials will ask for a bail out and I'm sure the liberals in Washington will again be generous with our money. And if the bail out isn't granted, then the liberals will tell the retirees and public workers that it's all the Republicans' fault.

It's the fault of those who were playing hard and fast with money that the tax payers would make in the future. I think tax payers should have a little more say in how their hard earned money is spent after it's confiscated from them. I am tired of public unions and politicians who see our earnings as their slush fund and they spend billions without thought.

The liberals have been pushing for socialism and redistributing our money. They blast the wealthy, all the while offering generous bonuses, perks and lifetime benefits to their buddies. Somehow, they find it more noble to be a taker than a giver. No one should be a keeper, according to them. It's only a matter of time before they dip into our savings. They've already spent the Social Security money, they are lusting after our 401Ks and the last will be our nest eggs that we've built over decades.

Meanwhile, they will blame anyone or anything but themselves for the greed in Detroit that led to it's downfall. They chased tax payers away by continually taking more and more to fund their big promises, while letting neighborhoods go to shit. Unions and politicians lived high on the hog on the backs of the little people. The welfare dependents grew while the tax payer base shrunk.

It is totally the fault of the liberals that this happened and we should not bail them out. I am sorry for those who were foolish enough to take jobs in a place that was going to shit and expecting to actually collect.

 

[ShootSpeeders]

Take away elderlies pensions? Hmm, I'd like to see you end up as many of them would, on the streets, with cardboard signs and hungry.

It's not about taking away their pensions. The money is not there. So the issue is whether money should be taken from other taxpayers and given to these retirees.

 

[boedicca]

Take away elderlies pensions? Hmm, I'd like to see you end up as many of them would, on the streets, with cardboard signs and hungry.

It's not about taking away their pensions. The money is not there. So the issue is whether money should be taken from other taxpayers and given to these retirees.

Right now, the pensions are being paid by gutting the funding for police, fire protection, infrastructure maintenance...iow, current services for city residents.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Take away elderlies pensions? Hmm, I'd like to see you end up as many of them would, on the streets, with cardboard signs and hungry.

It's not about taking away their pensions. The money is not there. So the issue is whether money should be taken from other taxpayers and given to these retirees.

Well, I see it this way. Detroit made promises to its retirees that it could not keep. So instead of telling them to tighten their belts and quit complaining, they caved in to their will. And, instead of funding the things they need to fund, instead of helping fund their first responders, and their men in blue, or something to improve their horrendous infrastructure (believe me, everyone's seen the pictures)... they funded the greed and avarice of its retirees. So, it's a circle of death basically.

 

[TemplarKormac]

Take away elderlies pensions? Hmm, I'd like to see you end up as many of them would, on the streets, with cardboard signs and hungry.

Did it ever occur to you that retirees aren't the only ones living in Detroit? Their pensions are putting people out of work. How ironic is that?

 

[ShootSpeeders]

[

It is totally the fault of the liberals that this happened and we should not bail them out. I am sorry for those who were foolish enough to take jobs in a place that was going to shit and expecting to actually collect.

Govt workers need to realize that when you work in a city that is mostly black and is run by blacks, then the city is gonna collapse. Blacks can't do anything right outside of sports.

 

[ShootSpeeders]

[

Right now, the pensions are being paid by gutting the funding for police, fire protection, infrastructure maintenance...iow, current services for city residents.

What they should do is reduce the welfare checks, but then the deadbeat blacks that caused this mess will scream.

 

[TemplarKormac]

[

Right now, the pensions are being paid by gutting the funding for police, fire protection, infrastructure maintenance...iow, current services for city residents.

What they should do is reduce the welfare checks, but then the deadbeat blacks that caused this mess will scream.

Let them. Do what is best for the whole city.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Do you fools think Detroit is the only bankrupt city?

Do you think only Democrats increased the gifts showered on public employees around the country during the Wall Street derivatives boom?

I strongly suggest you investigate the derivative schemes your own local metropolis is all wound up in. You might find your hair falling out.

Derivatives pulled down Detroit?

Really?

 

[Stashman]

Of course they should not, and no political reasons are behind my opinion.

Like most folks they paid into their pension fund, and for that reason alone should get their money due to them. Why is there always some political BS that gets in the way of just plain ole common sense?